


Withstand

by CooperJR



Series: Gon gets Gone, Photo by K. Z. [6]
Category: Hunter X Hunter
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Angst, Confessions, Friendship, Heartbreak, M/M, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-06
Updated: 2021-01-06
Packaged: 2021-03-12 22:41:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,632
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28518066
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CooperJR/pseuds/CooperJR
Summary: Gon was smiling at him.“I’m sorry, Killua.”This was worse. Killua’s lip wobbled. An actual refusal, one made with Gon sounding so sincere, this would be the worst thing Killua could ever dream. Had ever thought to dream.~~~~~Prompt: “Wait, so we aren’t dating?”
Relationships: Gon Freecs/Killua Zoldyck
Series: Gon gets Gone, Photo by K. Z. [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2000959
Comments: 6
Kudos: 69





	Withstand

**Author's Note:**

  * For [KilluaZoldick](https://archiveofourown.org/users/KilluaZoldick/gifts).



> my laptop broke so I may be struggling for a bit ;; I’ll try to keep y’all updated on Twitter!
> 
> NOTE: this is a college prequel!! About 8 years before ‘If Only’

Killua had missed Gon. He really had. Going the whole year without talking to someone you had spent the last 5 years with was rough. Especially when the problem wasn't between the two of them.

Initially, Killua had been looking forward to picking up where they left off. Completing his GED, making sure to get into the same college as Gon. His classload had been a bit on the heavier side in hopes of making up the lost year’s worth of credits. He’d even been able to score a few of the same classes as Gon so they could spend time studying together. Killua thought everything would just pick up as they had left it. He’d even told Gon that.

But now?

Killua shoved Gon’s hand off his shoulder. “Stop! Gon, let go, you don’t- I don’t need you hanging around me all the time.”

His best friend had been unbearably clingy. Not the normal clingy either. Normal clingy just meant...always around. In Killua’s peripheral. Sending random thoughts in the form of texts. 

Nodding along with Killua’s answers in class.

New clingy? Now he was scooting chairs closer. Brushing shoulders. He’d tap Killua’s hands or arms or shoulders to get his attention.

And now he was saying his  _ name _ like he-

“Killua?” Gon blinked, stepping back. He looked surprised, like Killua had hit him. Killua would admit it's the first time all week he’d had actually thrown Gon’s hands off of him, but Gon  _ knew _ how he felt about getting touched. He’d known for years.

Killua frowned. He didn't want to talk about whatever was going on with him right here at campus. “Don’t you have somewhere to be?” Killua’s mind scrambled to a conversation from yesterday, Gon telling Zushi something... “I thought you had a date tonight or something. You don’t need to cancel it for me. I’ll just spend the rest of the night studying.”

Rather than seem relieved, Gon’s frown turned sad. He fidgeted, hand dancing around his pants pocket that usually held his phone.

Killua was used to Gon acting odd before dates, but this… “What, what’s that look for?”

Gon’s mouth twisted. He looked down at his shoes, and Killua could see him thinking. He finally glanced up through his lashes, voice soft. “Are you...canceling our date?”

Killua almost dropped his text books. His heart thudded painfully, the ache carrying over into his arms. “ _ What? _ Did you just say  _ our _ date?”

Gon’s bottom lip wobbled before he heaved a sigh, leaning back and dragged a hand over his face. “So...we aren’t dating?” Gon was pointedly looking up at the trees above Killua’s head. He was intentionally not looking at Killua. 

“Gon. What the fuck are you talking about.”

“Last week. When we were… I thought… do you not want to date me?”

Killua really did drop his textbooks. One tumbled and hit his ankle. He cussed, sidestepping away and spinning his face away from Gon. Last week? What had he said? Had he ruined it? Killua’s mind raced, flashing through anything and everything that had happened in the last week. He finally blinked, turning to stare at Gon. “Last- at Alluka’s party? When I-“

Gon held up a hand, halting Killua. He cleared his throat then looked around. Was his face red? Killua also started to look around. Was Gon looking for an out on this conversation? “Killua.” Killua definitely heard it. A tone. A certain...thing to the way Gon had been saying his name. Had he always said it that way? “Do you want to date me?”

Panic caused a headache to bloom behind Killua's eyes. Date Gon? Dating meant kissing, and nervousness, and avoiding people, and talking about the other person to other people, and  _ holding _ each other. 

What Gon and Killua had could withstand a lot of things. Illumi for one. Strange alien plant viruses for another. Hell, even the year long separation hadn’t seemed to dampen what bond they had between the two. 

Killua had thought, anyways. 

_ Dating _ Gon. The idea had never presented itself before Killua. “That’s not what we were fucking talking about. Gon, I missed you, but I missed loads of people. I cut myself out for a whole year. That’s- when I said things would be different-”

“Killua, you're avoiding the question.”

“I’m not avoiding shit. Your basing this off what I said-“

“Killua. I want to date you. I want us to be together.”

“You- we’ll be together no matter what. We’re best friends. We- what if-“ Gon  _ wanted _ this? Wanted Killua? Wanted to- Killlua jerked away, grabbing the textbooks before looking back at Gon. “I’m not fucking talking about this here.”

Killua walked away, glancing to see Gon had not moved, still looking at the spot Killua had been standing in.

~

Killua was doing his best to not talk to his sister. He was also doing his best to study. He really was trying. He’d even left his phone and laptop in his bedroom while he sat on the futon and read through his textbook and took notes. 

To help him stay focused on studying.

But in the last hour he’d only succeeded at marking down a perfectly round and filled in bullet point on every other line of his note page.

There was no way this could be bothering him.

Gon had just meant he wanted to take Killua on a friend date, right?

Maybe if he started on the next chapter subject, a new topic might be more interesting. He could always ask Zushi for help on the current subject, and if Killua read ahead he could return the favor. He’d just flip forward a little bit until a topic stood out. The best way to learn new things was to base it off of interest, right?

Why did Gon say his name like he did?

Shit. What page were they on in class? He’d skipped to the late hundreds. There was no way they were anywhere close to that topic. He’d forgotten to bookmark it in some way. What had the new title been? Was it….

Was it Gon who was acting weird about this? Or was it Killua?

“Brother.”

“I told you I’m studying, Alluka.”

“Oh? Brother, it’s been two hours. You haven't written a single note since I  _ last _ tried to ask you about what happened.” She stepped forward, tapping on the little smiley face she had drawn in one corner of the margins.

Killua scowled at her. “I put that there.”

“Oh?” She reached to grab the notebook from him, but he shifted his forearm over it. “Brother, if it's bothering you so much why wont you do something about it?”

“Nothing is bothering me.”

“Oh?”

“Would you  _ stop saying that-” _

“‘Alluka I messed up.’”

Killua’s jaw clamped shut.

She continued reading from her phone. “‘I planned on talking to Killua more tonight but now he’s mad at me.’”

“I’m not  _ mad at-” _

“If you say ‘Gon’ then you know  _ exactly _ who it is that messaged me and you just admitted that  _ something _ is going on between the two of you.”

Killua cursed. “I’m glad the brains skipped me and went straight to you in the family,” he muttered, snapping his textbook closed.

Alluka threw a lock of hair over her shoulder. “I know. Too bad Mom and Illu don’t believe you.”

“Their loss.”

Killua’s head whipped to the staircase. Gon’s head peeked from around the stair wall, a sly grin on his face.

“Alluka. Why is Gon in the house?”

She twirled back to the stairs, bouncing up each step, singing, “Because I let him in~” She paused, leaning into Gon’s back to look at Killua. “And he has a key now.” She ran the rest of the way up.

Rather than acknowledge his traitorous sister, Killua chose to shuffle around his notes and put his books away into his bag. He pointedly ignored Gon.

In his peripheral he saw Gon settle on the stairs, legs stretched out in front. Gon patted his hands on his knees in an uneven rhythm for a time. 

Out of stubbornness, Killua sat, gazing in front. He had no distraction, nothing to look at. His phone was still in his room, the console for his tv and gaming system was several feet away, mocking him.

There was no way he was going to be the first one to crack. He hadn’t even started this. It was Gon’s fault. Gon had been the one to talk about weird shit like dating. It was Gon’s fault Killua was uncomfortable in his own house. That Killua was mad in the first place. One week since they'd met up again, and Gon had already gone and fucked things up.

The noise in the stairway finally stopped.

Killlua held his breath.

“I didn't notice it for a while. After you left, there was so much commotion about the… about what happened in the forest.” Killua saw Gon reach for his shoulder, tracing a line along his collarbone. As the hand dropped, Killua had to turn his head back to the spot he was boring into the wall. “I started to write letters, once I was alone and could think. I wrote to you about what I’d dream about, about things that happened in the day. I’d write about what Kurapika or Leorio had said, or what memes Ikalgo had sent me. At first, that’s what I’d write. Then I started to have so many dreams about you.”

Killua involuntarily gasped, then clapped a hand over his mouth.

If Gon noticed, he didn’t say. Didn’t pause. “They’d be simple, small things. Like me running into you while I was out on an errand, you sitting in a lecture with me. I’d wake up reaching out to you, hoping the last few months without you was the real dream. I wrote about each one, every detail I could remember. It was selfish, but even if I could be with you in just a dream, it made things better.

“Mito got worried, the first few weeks. I’d sleep in later than usual, went on for a while, and she was convinced I was sick or some ghost had taken me. I tried to tell her that it was just me trying to dream, that I was missing my best friend, missing you. But then she said… something. 

“The way she said it, I just sorta...blinked. I blinked and knew that she was right. That I never missed anyone the way that I missed you. That I never talked with anyone the way I wanted to talk to you. I had a novel of pages, things I couldn’t wait to tell you that I hadn’t told anyone else. I still have them, if you want me to give them to you.”

Killua waited to hear anything more from him. To hear a reason, another story, an actual confession, a feeling. To hear that Gon had been holding back for years. To hear that he’d realized he was in love with Killua all this time.

Even if Killua heard that Gon was in love only after he was gone... It would hurt to hear it, a bittersweetness medicine to his own aching heart. But-

But no, Gon went quiet. 

Gon had said his piece. He said what he had wanted and he would wait for Killua to make the next move. Gon could be as patient a damn tree, waiting for a reaction from him. He’d done the same when they’d gone hunting for stories or photos, during long lines to lectures. Waiting for words to come naturally when writing essays or articles, he could sit for hours and hours. Patient.

Killua wanted to scream. He wanted to cry, or throw something, or shriek at the frustration of being dangled this dream of his, come partially true. He wanted to shake Gon and make him say it first. Admit to it. Killua wanted Gon to be the one to say it first.

Wanted to hear it before he said it and was the one to make a mistake.

But between this - a damned stairway admittance - and the way Gon had been acting the last week, surely Killua couldn’t fuck it up worse than it already was?

“I’ve-“ Killua started, voice cracking. He sighed, clearing his throat. “I’ve known for...a few years. It was back when… when we were in that AP class with Alluka. The professor said something wrong about… I think it was local beaver damage, but you immediately said ‘porcupines’ and… you snickered. You shook your head and laughed, and then I caught myself smiling before you even told me why it was funny.”

Killua swallowed. “It was then I realized that I liked you. You were my first friend, but since then we’ve met so many more people, and I care about them all, but you? I know your laugh from hundreds of others. You can look at me and know my joke before I’ve even said anything. I’ll do anything, I’ve  _ done _ some pretty stupid stuff, just to hear you say my name. Just to hear you call out to me. I knew I liked you, but when we were gone… I missed you more than you can believe. Everyday I’d read something and want to tell you about it. Or when i started to fix up the house, I’d always wish you were with me, anywhere near me. I’d want to cry from how much I just wanted to tell you that I l-love you-“

Killua had been staring at his hands, unable to bear if Gon would get up and just leave. If he was surprised by it, they could both just pretend Killua and Gon hadn’t said anything. It would be awkward at first, but they could move past it. They’d been through worse. They could-

Gon pulled his face up, fingers under his chin, a thumb grazing up his cheekbone. 

Gon was smiling at him.

“I’m sorry, Killua.” 

This was worse. Killua’s lip wobbled. An actual refusal, one made with Gon sounding so  _ sincere _ , this would be the worst thing Killua could ever dream. Had ever thought to dream. 

“Killua, I didn’t mean to tease you like that. I wanted… you said you love me?”

Killua bit his lip, looking down then back up to meet Gon’s eyes. He leaned his face into Gon’s palm, taking what he could get before he was left with nothing. “Yeah. I love...love you.” His voice sounded so raw, the words felt like glass-

“Killua. I wanted to tease you, I wanted to make sure you liked me, but...but I wanted to be the one to say it first. Now I’m mad I waited to tell you I love you.” Gon pouted, a frown on his brow.

Killua breath stuttered and stilled in his chest. Gon’s hand felt warm on his face. His thumb still moved, slowly, back and forth. It was making it hard to think. Gon what? He wanted...what? What had he said? The words echoed in his mind but he still couldn’t believe them. Killua swallowed again. “Say it,” he croaked. “Say it one more time.”

“Killua?”

“Tell me you love me.”

He smiled, slow and a bit sad, or maybe hopeful? “Killua.” Ah, the tone. There it was again. Like he was sighing from his heart. Killua recognized it, suddenly. He’d heard his own voice do that in the darkness of dreams hidden behind sunlit smiles. “I love you. Would… would you want to go on a date with me, Killua?”

Killua breathed in, finally feeling some kind of relief to the tightness in his chest since earlier that day. “Yeah. Yeah I’ll go out with you.”

**Author's Note:**

> HAPPY BIRTHDAY FIO!!! <3


End file.
